The Book Thief
Part 5: Sketches
Summary & Analysis

LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Book Thief, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.

Death

Words and Language

Books

Stealing and Giving

Color, Beauty, and Ugliness

Summary

Analysis

That summer is productive for Max, as he begins to write and sketch and has lots of ideas. He intended to write his own story, but then he starts making random sketches that feel real to him. He intends to give this new book to Liesel when she is older.

Besides his hatred of Hitler, Max also keeps up his spirit by making art – his sketches are grim and unconventional, but are a way of processing his grief and creating something greater than himself.

Active
Themes

One day Liesel comes downstairs and finds Max asleep, and she looks at two pages of his book. Death recreates a picture of Hitler "conducting" a crowd in song with the heil salute, and a picture of a swastika sun shining down on a mountain of bodies. Liesel is frightened by what she sees, and Max wakes up.

Max's visual sense seems to coincide with Death's, especially with regards to the Nazi sun – the sky connecting to the tragic earth. Max translates horror into satire through his art.